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Sixth of the Dusk Spoiler Thread


Chaos

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So I had an idea, what if the Ones Above are a multi-planetary organization? Possibly with Scadrial being one of the founding members, who added the Prime directive thing under the guidance of Harmony. Those that are visiting First of the Sun are then a group trying to skirt that rule through a loophole.

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I liked the story, and after reading the first page of this thread, I wonder if it's just because I read absolutely zero allegory into the wrapping of the bird wings. I couldn't help but make mental comparisons to Shadows for Silence, just because of the feeling of constant danger and frontier setting. Dusk could've done more than "look back at the island" to realize his hope-speech, but it wasn't terrible for a short story. This is the sort of situation where we simply cannot see long-term resolution. The best we can hope for is "at least we can prepare and make things hard for them."

People are mentioning about how we only see 2 powers, but no one is mentioning the myriad of other powers we see: nearly every other denizen of the archipelago. The native Aviar shelter all minds near them automatically, just like a coppercloud. So this is technically a selfish ability (which everyone else just happens to benefits from), just as surely as predators hunting by detecting minds. Sak is the real and true exception, here, not "the birds" categorically.

One thing I keep fixating on: the question is asked time and again "what gives these birds talents?" and the solution was simpy "it's the worms." Why isn't anyone asking the follow-up question: "what gives these worms talents?" This makes me wonder if the bond is what's important. The parasites are bathed in Investiture all their lives and maybe that's enough. But maybe it just grooms them to the task of becoming spren that don't take no for an answer.

+1 @Outis for drinking game.

Edit: Weiry, I keep feeling like you're overlooking the notion of bad Scadrians. Harmony or no, there is no getting around a simple truth: we have at least 7 more books of Scadrian antagonists.

Edited by Pechvarry
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Haven't read Sixth of Dust yet, but on the topic of Bad Scadrians...

That seems like the natural course for their story arc to take.

 

The first trilogy was all about the skaa liberating themselves, first from the Lord Ruler, then from the threat of noble take over, then finally from Ruin.

Allow of Law shows us Scadrians who might not oppress other cultures (though they haven't met the South Pole ones yet), but whoa re more than capable of using and abusing one another, alá the Vanishers.

 

A future Mistborn trilogy, where the oppressed have become the oppressors, and where the storyline involves a Kelsier-like revolution against the corrupt Scadrian's, similar to how the series started, seems like the natural end point to me.

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What I don't understand is how the specifications of a machine like that are supposed to help the locals develop more advanced technologies.  If the machine is any kind of fabrial, it would be impossible to duplicate on a different Shard/Splinter world.  Even the "concepts and ideas" explained (realmatic theory?) wouldn't be as applicable to the way Investiture works on the archipelago.  

 

Mistborn have no problem using their powers off-world, so I don't see why Allomantic fabrials would have that restriction. The problem is that we really have very little idea on how the Metallic Arts are used mechanically.

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I thought it was perfectly structured I really liked the ending. The banding together against unbeatable odds and the implication a lot more is to come. I love open endings like that.

This is probably exactly why I did not really like the ending.

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Haven't read Sixth of Dust yet

GET THEE GONNE.

In other news, a Splinter of Survival actually makes sense: the Magic Jar, the Phylactery, whatever you want to call it. Investing a self-splinter in a planet you're not even on would be a great ace in the hole for surviving what you cannot beat. Like Odium.

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GET THEE GONNE.

In other news, a Splinter of Survival actually makes sense: the Magic Jar, the Phylactery, whatever you want to call it. Investing a self-splinter in a planet you're not even on would be a great ace in the hole for surviving what you cannot beat. Like Odium.

 

But... but... okay...

 

Though I will say I don't know if Brandon would go with that as an idea. Yes, like you say it's kind of an old fantasy trope with the phylactery and what not... but given how J.K.Rowling the whole Horcrux thing, I wonder if people might think he's being derivative of her.

 

And...

Brandon says there is a Shard who just wants to survive, correct?

 

Does he mean the Shard, itself, has an intention of Survival, or the shardholder wants to survive and is stopping the Intend/impulse to invest themselves?

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And...

Brandon says there is a Shard who just wants to survive, correct?

 

Does he mean the Shard, itself, has an intention of Survival, or the shardholder wants to survive and is stopping the Intend/impulse to invest themselves?

Here is Chaos' signing report on it. He *is* asking for the name of an Intent, so I would say the "hide and survive" is at least partially do to the Intent.  That said "Survival" is unlikely to be Intent (since it doesn't exactly include the hide part)

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Not all Cosmere stories feature Hoid - Shadows of Silence in the Forests of Hell didn't have him, for example.

 

The Ones Above... given that they have spaceships, they would be worldhoppers almost by definition I think. In the commentary included in the anthology Brandon mentioned that he included them mostly to tie the story with the Cosmere, or something to that effect; which miiight suggest that they are Scadrians, because they are the only people we know will figure out space travel, so that kiiind of ties in. 

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The Ones Above, are those worldhoppers I spy? Where's Hoid in this one? Shouldn't he be in this somewhere since it's Cosmere?

 

As Argent said, Hoid doesn't feature in *every* cosmere story, he isn't just some cameo character, he has a reason for being where he is.

 

Question

Is Hoid in Shadows for Silence?

Brandon Sanderson

He is not. I intentionally didn't put him in... I wanted to indicate that he goes where there is an important reason for him to be there rather than just being a cameo in every story.

(source)

 

And I'm still super skeptical about the Ones Above being Scadrian.  The main argument I'm seeing is that "Oh they are the only ones we've been expressly told will develop FTL" which just doesn't cut it for me. Has anyone ever asked Brandon about other worlds developing FTL? Not that I've seen.  I just don't think Scadrians will have a monopoly on space travel.

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And I'm still super skeptical about the Ones Above being Scadrian.  The main argument I'm seeing is that "Oh they are the only ones we've been expressly told will develop FTL" which just doesn't cut it for me. Has anyone ever asked Brandon about other worlds developing FTL? Not that I've seen.  I just don't think Scadrians will have a monopoly on space travel.

 

I think there are two big things pointing towards this, besides the aforementioned point that we've only ever heard about Scadrians.

 

First, obviously magical technology that utilizes/interacts with Investiture. We know that the Scadrians are going to have this, while some other culture, say, Sel, might just rely more on personal use of magic to get the job done. Specifically the "investiture detector" machine rather screams of Allomantic bronze.

 

This isn't ironclad, though because I swear there's a WoB on all magic systems having some branch that can "detect" ala Allomantic bronze, but I can't find it at the moment.

EDIT: Found it! :D

Turns out it isn't universal, but still.

Source:

Q: Is there a way to tell between different Investitures?

A: [brandon misunderstood the question a little in the beginning - he thought the question was "can every Shard's magic detect other Investitures?"] Most of the magics have built into them that ability, but I wouldn't say that everyone does. I am trying to remember if all of them have... I lot of them have a power that would allow you to do that, but I don't know if every one of them does.
Q: [Clarification]
A: If you were really good at burning bronze, you could distinguish between different types of Investiture from different planets even. And that sort of skill does exist in other magic systems.
Me: Is it like a wavelength kind of thing?
A: Yea, that's exactly what it is.

---

 

Second, if you look at the first draft Dusk intuits that the emissary who "died" wasn't actually dead, guessing correctly that the Ones Above reclaimed his "body." Now that narrows it down a tad more, because we've yet to see much that can convincingly make a living person look like he's dying, then leave him seeming dead for some unknown period of time until the body was collected. Beyond looking dead, he'd have to keep himself alive despite possibly being stored in some uninhabitable environment in the interim.

 

This suggests a kandra or feruchemist, as Moogle posited.

 

--

 

I do agree that they likely don't have a monopoly, though, especially given the implication in-text that there were "Others Above" who didn't follow the Prime Directive.

Edited by Kurkistan
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Have we considered that First of the Sun's Shard/Splinter/Investiture source might not be held by a human/Yolish entity? With all the creatures on Patji having some kind of mental aspect, is that enough for one of them to pick up a shard?

 

We know that shards can be influenced by the person picking them up, at least initially, until the shard's intent overwhelms the bearer. So if the shard was picked up by one of the death- or night- critters, that could produce a world with increased hostility towards life, but with a shard's intent showing through in the long run, like the outcome of preparing the inhabitants of this world for a higher form of conflict.

 

Also, I'm not on the Scadrian gravy train - it does sound a bit more like a far future coalition of worlds to me. The combination of fabrials and possible Scadrian magic ("dead" emissary as people have mentioned) indicates that we could have multiple investitures working together.

 

Or we have a race that developed on a world untouched by Odium or Ruin. A world without conflict, so the inhabitants didn't have the Dark Ages implied by the Final Empire and every damnation Desolation out! Scadrian tech was intentionally hampered for at least 1000 years, and it would have taken a while before Ruin and Preservation would have been able to work together. And Roshar tech was explicitly reset every time that a Desolation occurred, to the point that the Heralds were teaching them how to rework bronze every time.

 

So I posit that there could be a hyper advanced race out there with lasers and awesomeness, and a bit of a superiority complex - imagine rolling around the Cosmere finding only worlds that were literally Stone Age, while you've got a hologram reminding you that your artificial gravity is awesome.

 

These guys could also have beamed up Demoux or otherwise influenced the 17th Shard... (Sort of ranty post, but Dusk has been rolling around in my head all week.)

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I'm cautiously opposed to the idea of the Ones Above being Scadrians. I don't have any points to make that haven't already been made right now though. Perhaps it's just that I like the idea of multiple space traveling races of human and want to see another.

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OK, initial reactions (I'll need a reread with my laptop near this time to take notes).

 

 - I liked the notion of a setting that is the rain forest on steroids

 - Definitely a shardpool of some sort.  Do we know if shardpools always have a color?

 - Wonder if the parasites that are in the worms that the Aviars eat could live in a human.  Parasites don't always transfer species to species.

 - I'm of the opinion that the Ones Above are more like an intergalatic organization consisting of many different planets rather than just Scadrians.  No real support for this.  I just like the idea because Scadrians seem a little too easy of an answer (no easy answers, remember!)

 - I didn't mind the ending, but I'm definitely going to want to see resolution of some sort to this at some point.

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Re: Shardic "Horcrux:" I think a survival mechanism like this has barely ever been explored in the scope of a not-antagonist. Putting it on the "wildcard" character could open some interesting plots where the good and bad have too much at risk, so whoever could influence this 3rd party (overcome a policy of non-intervention as it were) would be the victor.

Also, I keep playing the Devil's Advocate for why The Ones Above could be Scadrians so, for the record, I'd like to finally state my own opinion: I hope it's another planet.

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Definitely a shardpool of some sort.  Do we know if shardpools always have a color?

 

I'm very hesitant around shardpools - the impression I've gotten from WoB is that we're all facing the wrong direction on these. The community named them "shardpools," not Sanderson, so I'm tying my damnedest to come up with another interpretation. This story marks the biggest exposure to a 'pool that we've seen since Elantris, so I'm convinced that there's a clue or two in there for us to find. I'm going to let it roll around in my head before going back for another read through.

 

 

 

Wonder if the parasites that are in the worms that the Aviars eat could live in a human.  Parasites don't always transfer species to species.

 

I thought Dusk eating some of the fruit was going to lead to a power up moment, but of course someone would have tried it over the years. It's interesting that the effects only seem to transfer to humans. Would the other life on Patji gain abilities if an Aviar landed on them?

 

 

 

I'm of the opinion that the Ones Above are more like an intergalatic organization consisting of many different planets rather than just Scadrians.  No real support for this.  I just like the idea because Scadrians seem a little too easy of an answer (no easy answers, remember!)

 

I agree, but Harmony and non-intervention Prime Directives seem to go hand in hand. It's got to be a red herring! (And would be very much answered by a timeline...)

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It could be that this is set so far into the future that Scandrians just happen to be the first ones on the scene in traveling everywhere but by then may not be the only ones. Considering how Roshar's history is built on conquest and being extremely factious, there could be an intrepid Alethi consortium looking for innate investiture that they can soup up with stormlight or something. Hard to tell.

 

Or on the other hand they could be from Braise and have a bunch of White Sand peoples or something.

 

During my Reread of WoR Sigzil mentioned the color of the Horneater's Oceans of Life. Emerald. We know Hoid got to Roshar through them meeting Rock along the way. And they are emerald.

 

Anyone remember what color the Shardpool in Elantris was?

Edited by Darkarma
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Would the other life on Patji gain abilities if an Aviar landed on them?

 

What I'm kinda thinking is that the Nightmaws have consumed worms (either directly or through eating Aviar) and that's how they got their telepathic hunting abilities. Kinda the same with the other psychic creatures in the story.

-

It probably isn't right, but that's just the impression I got.

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Probably not. The worms seem to only live on Patji, and species that are not birds would have a hard time getting there (and it's implied that the predators, such as nightclaws, are on all the islands).

Edited by Argent
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Probably not. The worms seem to only live on Patji, and species that are not birds would have a hard time getting there (and it's implied that the predators, such as nightclaws, are on all the islands).

 

Nightmaws could be based on the Komodo dragons. In which case they will eat anything that moves and will willing swim great distances to other islands with ease.

Edited by Darkarma
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